Thanks so much.

-cvj

Mind I personally think this doesn’t matter much because you can get a good college education pretty much no matter where you end up in this country (assuming the student loans don’t kill you first- another rant for another day). But by the same hand there will always be some out there who won’t think of it that way and who will slip through the cracks because they couldn’t invest to get the top-notch science fair award, and they probably will suffer a little for it.

Best,

-cvj

I thought you might want to read this.

http://www.economist.com/world/international/displaystory.cfm?story_id=10251324

“the OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment shows average attainment staying largely flat … compares the reading, mathematical and scientific progress of 400,000 15-year-olds in the 30 OECD countries and 27 others, covering 87% of the world economy… United States… was poor by world standards … Britain is way down the league…

And what can be done to ensure that budding scientists blossom? Give them teachers with excellent qualifications in science, spend plenty of time on the subject and engage their enthusiasm with after-school clubs, events and competitions, says the report.”

Cheers.

Well, when I got to college I realized that confidence is more important than any hair cut. And, there is actually a subset of women who find guys doing math sexy. (Don’t ask me—I don’t understand women at ALL.)

The basic capitalist drive is to leverage what you have into more. Perhaps, in our society, for kids whose parents are scientists, a gamble on a $100,000 dollar science fair prize seems feasible. Others might consider playing basketball or baseball or football or being a DJ or a singer might be the more feasible gamble for them based on the sort of mentorship closest at hand. The economics would predict specializations, the way it doesn’t make sense to try to grown certain crops in certain places.

Of course, massive government intervention can always create new equilibriums.

But as #10 pointed out, these science competitions are definitely stacked in favor of those few who are groomed from a young age, and/or have connections. I bet the same could be said for chess or musical or athletic contests. Kids being involved in any sort of high-stakes competition usually creeps me out.

But it is and probably will always be a joke to think …

Well, while I agree it is harder, and should not be quite so much harder, it is certainly not impossible. There are several examples of people “making it” without such privileged backgrounds.

(Most) scientists need access to laboratories or computers and colleagues; equestrians need access to horses, stables, and courses; normal children don’t have access to either.

Again, I’d not state it so strongly myself. As a kid I had a great time learning science on my own by taking apart people’s thrown-off electronics (etc), fixing things, and building new things from junk, and teaching myself things from old magazines and books that nobody wanted. I could not afford anything new. I was interested in science and I just made do with what I found around me and never sat around waiting for new stuff.

Part of the problem is that we seem to be increasingly focusing value on playthings that are new and shiny and fancy. There’s a laboratory to be found in the world around us that we see every day and it is free to do experiments with it. The science you can learn from experiments with the stuff in your house is more advanced than anything you do in the first year of freshman college level.

I think that you are underestimating the value of a good teacher to help make the best of the resources that even “normal” children have access to.

What I do agree with is that not having the fancy stuff will mean that the judges will be more likely to overlook you in the science fairs…. but that’s a different matter - there’s far more to a career in science than doing well in a science fair.

Best,

-cvj

The only student entering science fair competitions during the years I was there was the daughter of a chemistry professor. She had access to labs. No one else did, and in fact when I approached several professors at the time to ask how a high school student or an undergraduate would go about learning how to do research, I was turned away by every single one.

Likewise, the only students consistently doing well in math, entering competitions, and going on to math/physics-related majors in college were the sons of a math professor. Just about everyone else did relatively poorly on SAT math and ended up in remedial math classes in college.

I did not know that science fair competitions even existed on this high level until I myself left home for college and met some students who had competed. (All of them had parents in the sciences.)

I think we’d be worse off without these types of competitions to stimulate interest and encourage participation, and I admire the participants, who are all hard-working and bright.

But it is and probably will always be a joke to think that children with ordinary backgrounds will have access to this level of science/math education until, and if, they choose to do science and math in college, and often not even then if they attend an ordinary public university.

I don’t see too many children from ordinary backgrounds becoming top-ranking English-style equestrians, either. (Most) scientists need access to laboratories or computers and colleagues; equestrians need access to horses, stables, and courses; normal children don’t have access to either.

That’s just how it is.

I agree! It is pretty impressive what they do in science competitions. I’ve noticed this in science fair judging too. This is why - first and foremost - congratulations were right up front! (Whether they have scientist parents is certainly not to be held against them - the issue was how we can get more people involved in science, and succeeding, irrespective of parentage. Better teachers, resources, and so forth.)

And on another note: Did the hair thing work out for you then?

-cvj

Whether or not the kids parents are scientists, I think this is still pretty impressive.

Most of the physicists I work with at my institution don’t have scientific parental influences. I think what you’re seeing is that at such a young age the *only* influence can be parents (or maybe other kids at school, but they know little beyond how to conduct the experiment of if something is in there nose). I think what’s important is that somebody takes you under their wing at some point (eg. teacher, advisor, etc.). In my experiences, people are first limited by having access to what’s required to learn, followed by being limited by not wanting to learn, and lastly being limited by being unable to learn (this is rare!)

To change the topic, in reply to another comment, I think the comment on academia (at least in physics) being a caste is absurd, but that’s a long chat nobody cares about.

(P.S. It’s probably a random fluctuation, but all of the Oxbridge people I’ve worked with have had parents with math/physics doctorates, so is it easier to succeed in the states? How efficient at rejecting talent are A-levels?)

Why? Would you have said the same thing about women not having the vote, not so long ago? I don’t think that we should simply sit back and accept unequal access in our society. That’s what this is, to some extent. There’s nothing wrong with handing on a family’s traditional career choice - and this very natural…. but to have that as largely the only way someone can succeed in a field is not a good thing for society or for the field in question.

Cheers,

-cvj

Btw, The New York Times ran a great article on this very topic a few years ago, available here- http://www.nytimes.com/2005/03/09/education/09education.html?_r=1&oref=slogin